Rwanda sets 15 July 2024 election date for presidential, legislative polls

Rwanda will hold presidential and parliamentary elections on 15 July next year, the election commission said, with incumbent President Paul Kagame due to run for a fourth term in office to extend his roughly three decades in control of the East African country.

A presidential order published in the National Gazette on 11 December has confirmed the date for next year Presidential and Legislative elections, which will take place on 15 July 2024. “Throughout the country, the polling date for the president of the Republic and 53 deputies elected from a list proposed by political organizations or for independent candidates is Monday, 15 July 2024,” the National Electoral Commission said on X, formerly Twitter. It is the first time both presidential and legislative elections will be held on the same day, in what the electoral body said was an effort to minimize the cost of ballot as well as the time citizens spend electing their leaders.

A former rebel chief, the 66-year-old Kagame has ruled over the landlocked African nation with an iron fist for three decades. He has been the de facto leader of the West African country since the end of the 1994 genocide, became president in April 2000 and was re-elected in 2003, 2010 and 2017. Kagame presided over controversial constitutional amendments in 2015 that allowed him to continue in office for another decade. His only known challenger is opposition Green Party leader Frank Habineza, who announced in May his intention to run in 2024. Kagame has won international acclaim for presiding over peace and economic growth in Rwanda that lays claim to being one of the most stable countries in Africa. But he has faced mounting criticism by human rights groups that accuse Kagame of ruling in a climate of fear, stifling dissent and free speech, an accusation he rejects.